


La Vie En Rose

by Vaecordia



Category: Hetalia: Axis Powers
Genre: Cold War, Gift Fic, Historical, M/M, Non-Explicit Sex, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-31
Updated: 2018-07-31
Packaged: 2019-06-19 15:43:03
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 999
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15513105
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Vaecordia/pseuds/Vaecordia
Summary: In these days of his own godlessness and lack of faith, he finds his corner of heaven elsewhere.





	La Vie En Rose

**Author's Note:**

  * For [StarlightOnInk](https://archiveofourown.org/users/StarlightOnInk/gifts).



> This was a gift fic december dragon, a dear friend of mine, an awesome inspiration and just a wonderful person all around.

Ivan Braginsky was a Godless man.

He’d once been a man of ardent faith, believing his repentance to be found in his own suffering, finding comfort in the cold, awesome silences of churches when he prayed. 

As of late, he’d found himself forsaking God for the good of his country, as he’d been demanded to do. No longer did he glance guiltily away when he passed yet another church. He remembered the last time he’d prayed, his voice almost buried under the sound of gunfire and shelling, the city turning to ruin around him, him finding refuge the only place he knew- his faith. A few other souls beside his, lost and abandoned in the rubble of the destroyed city, had found refuge there. He had bowed his head, feeling the cold floor through the uniform, the words quiet on his lips. He’d been forced to push that night from his memory after the siege had lifted, but he never forgot it. 

It had taken him far too long, for his liking, to fit the ideal of his leaders, the model of the new nation he’d become. The Tsars were in the past, their legacy remaining only in history books - so they told him. And God had gone with them. Now, he perhaps finally believed he had turned into the man and the country that he should have been since the Revolution.

But he forgot all about that man, that country, in this corner of heaven he’d found for himself. This garden of Eden, tucked away between the old Parisian buildings, in a modest apartment, nestled between silk sheets, behind windows left ajar to let the morning breeze in, above streets still shrouded in the shadows of night, below a sky of dimming stars.

This was his haven, a second home, a sanctuary of his own. It was safe, familiar, quiet, theirs. He’d grown so accustomed to the place. He knew the way the sunrise would bring shards of light to break across the bedroom wall, a light of greyed gold cast throughout the room. The way the silk sheets -  _ nothing but the best silk from India, she herself provided me with these - _ caressed their warm skin in the morning, shifting with a soft rustle with each movement of their entwined bodies. The way Francis’ hair splayed like rays of sunlight against his ivory pillow, and the way his eyes - the eyes that held open skies - smiled at him through a sleepy haze. How that smile, even so early in the morning, was so radiant with ease, with softness. 

The way his voice lilted when he said, “ _ Bonjour, mon coeur _ ,” the soft, round vowels as enveloping as the warmth surrounding them. The way his fingers felt as they brushed against his skin in greeting, a gentle caress, the skin roughened by the centuries. How the air tasted after breakfast on the terrace - warm, but not yet carrying the stifling heat of summer. How the smoke wafted from Francis’ cigarette as he leaned on the iron railing, a soft smile on his lips as he gazed at Paris. Turned his blue eyes, a blue so pure and clear, to Ivan, before engaging in a quiet chatter. It didn’t matter what they spoke about - they didn’t need to speak about much. Everything felt heavenly.

Ivan found perhaps the most idyllic moments to be the ones where he would glide his fingers over the sleek polish of Francis’ grand piano, before sitting down on the stool. Fingers settling on the keys, a chord, perhaps a single note, from which he would then engage into a tune. Francis, who without fault always came into the room when he heard those first notes, would slide behind him, his hands coming to rest on his shoulders. Sometimes he sat next to him, sometimes settled himself on the couch to close his eyes and dwell in the music drifting in the apartment, often swaying to the tune Ivan played.

And then Ivan might change into something with a gentler tempo and a more swinging beat. Francis would open his eyes with a smile, as he stood and came to stand near Ivan, one hand resting on the piano, the other tucked into his pocket. 

He recognised the tune Ivan began playing every time. So far, Ivan hadn’t found a song that Francis couldn’t find and sing. And all the better. Francis’ voice was more angelic than any choir singing psalms of praise to the heavens, and to Ivan, any melody became all the sweeter with the careful, poetic lilt of his voice. And it was a moment lost in time, lost from the world, it was a moment of peace. A moment of perfection, the two of them isolated from everything but each other.

When they lay in bed, together, Ivan taking every second to explore the body under his hands, his lips, an altar for Ivan’s promises whispered into the skin. Francis’ gasps, the shifting of the sheets, every sound and movement was an inch closer to that paradise Ivan no longer sought. Ivan took an almost worshipping approach, meticulous and reverent, every single movement careful and devout. Francis called out to God, and Francis’ name fell from Ivan’s lips like a prayer. 

But perhaps the reason why Ivan no longer needed God to find his heaven was because this was so much more than that. Even if fleeting, always subject to the whims of their kind and time, the rivalries of nations occupying both their minds relentlessly, this was real. It was a reality that Ivan could always find in Paris, with Francis. Not an illusion, not a hope of salvation. It was visible. It was tangible. To him, this was all the Heaven he could ever ask for.

And perhaps Francis wasn’t God. Perhaps he was a man like any other, another nation, as flawed as every other − but he felt like salvation and tasted of absolution, and that was enough for Ivan. 


End file.
